Finally Here Together
by VescaWithoutWings
Summary: A KakaIru fairytale based upon The Little Match Girl. Possible spoilers for the current manga arc, but not really. Angst, oneshot


This story is based off of a very sad yet happy fairytale titled the Little Match Girl. I recommend you take a gander at it also. It was one of my favorites as a child.

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Finally Here Together

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It was a few steps to the next tree and a few more to the one after that. The barely seen trail he followed meandered back and forth, but he knew that he never passed the same tree twice. He still had that much of his senses about him.

His hands passed over the stolen pouch on his hip and creaked as his fingers felt the packages inside; precious weight that no one had known existed even though the best medic-nins had been trying to come up with it. The village had been attacked, their numbers depleted by a new poison, and he was bringing home the antidote for as long as he could.

The next tree was familiar. Maybe he had sat in it as a young genin or cried underneath it before he'd graduated. He didn't have the time or energy to remember as his thoughts focused only on placing one foot in front of another until the pain started again and he reached for the sack.

There were plenty of the small bottles inside all packed tightly in tiny boxes with fluff to protect their thin glass exteriors. There were plenty and he had to survive. A swift pull and the top was popped off, the liquid drunk down. It only took a moment for the pain to begin abating, but a new effect was seen. He saw someone waiting for him ahead, someone who knew this path better than he did.

He walked and walked; he couldn't run his feet were too torn for the action. Living trunks and dead bushes passed him until he had to stop and once more leave a trail marker of the small and empty bottle. He had to live; he had to see the person he was following once more.

Fewer steps were taken this time, more pain erupted within him and the premeasured dosages were downed faster until only one box out of five was left, but he knew this territory, he knew he was close and he wasn't following that person anymore. They stood and turned around, finally looked at him with those mismatched eyes that he'd missed for so long.

"Kakashi," he cried out and fell only to look up to see nothing; another dose gone.

"Kakashi!"

He couldn't even crawl, but his hands reached once more. He was there, he knew it and when the pain was gone he could see it. He drank again, two at a time, then a third so he could smile into his beloved's face once more.

"I missed you so much," he cried but he had no more tears. Pale hands finally reached down to touch his cheeks.

"It's okay, Iruka. You're home now, you're here."

Those hands stopped him as he once more reached for the bag. "You don't need it anymore, do you love? Leave the bag and come with me."

Hands were grasped and pain fell away. The pouch was left as he was led through the trees again out of the dark he'd been solidly walking towards. Kakashi was now leading him to a sunny spot where he knew they'd been before, a spot where they'd eaten and teased and where they could love each other in peace and privacy without worries.

"We're here now, aren't we," Iruka asked with warmth in his voice when they stopped moving.

"Yes, but we're finally here together."

* * *

The anbu report was short, the short masked shinobi almost shrinking into himself as he spoke. "We found him to the north. He was well within our territory, but somehow missed two patrols. The trail he took wasn't even a trail, maybe something a deer or wild dogs had made. That pouch was the only thing left on him of any use."

Tsunade grimaced as she looked into the bag. She carefully sifted through the empty glass vials noting that not a single one held any more of the precious liquid. "He was trying to get back home, to bring these to us, wasn't he?"

"The side effects of the poison were obvious, Hokage-sama. We can only assume that it was those vials keeping him alive long enough to travel."

Tsunade was ready to weep. They'd lost so many, and now one more when he'd had hope in his hands. She couldn't blame him for what he'd done because she knew that Iruka has been trying his hardest to bring these back to them; to make sure no one ever suffered the way he'd seen his… She paused.

"Thank you," she dismissed the anbu quietly waving him away from her mournful thoughts. The sparrow masked shinobi nodded and turned in an unusual maneuver instead of sinking into the shadows only to nearly miss being bowled over by Sakura erupting through the double doors.

"Tsunade-sama! In his hand, his hand, Iruka-sensei…" The pink haired girl was crying without a care as she thrust her fist forward. "I had to break his fingers to get to it, I had to break his fingers…"

She placed her closed and bloody hand on her Hokage's desk so that tired eyes could watch those tight fingers uncurl. "He was smiling, sensei." Within the bloody fist of her old sensei had been a treasure. A precious, precious gift; one last unopened vial of the antidote.

~Owari

A/N: This was written for the spring festival/challenge over at KakaIru on Livejournal. I hope you all enjoyed it. I based it upon some ideas that may be spoilers for the current story arc of the manga.


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